NASA announces accelerated plan to build moon base, skip lunar space station
March 24 (UPI) — NASA on Tuesday announced plans to spend $30 billion on a permanent lunar base and send astronauts to the moon every six months after the Artemis V mission.
Speaking at a so-called “Ignition” event at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C., Administrator Jared Isaacman discussed plans to accelerate construction of a moon base.
“There will be an evolutionary path to building humanity’s first permanent surface outpost beyond Earth,” he said.
“NASA is committed to achieving the near-impossible once again: to return to the moon before the end of President [Donald] Trump’s term, build a moon base, establish an enduring presence, and do the other things needed to ensure American leadership in space.”
NASA’s plan was initially to focus on what it called the Gateway program — a space station that was going to orbit the moon. Then the agency would build a base on the moon.
Carlos Garcia-Galan, the program executive for NASA’s Moon Base program, said the systems and hardware already established for the Gateway program would be repurposed to build the moon base.
Isaacman said the moon base plan will comprise three phases.
The first phase would include a series of missions to send small robotic landers and vehicles astronauts can drive on the surface to the moon. It would also encompass communications and scientific instruments.
The second phase would involve the construction of a “semi-habitable infrastructure” for astronauts on the lunar surface.
The third phase would start construction of a more permanent structure.
The first two phases would involve an investment of $20 billion over the next seven years and dozens of missions to the moon. The third phase would cost another $10 billion.
“The moon base will not appear overnight,” Isaacman said.
Isaacman said NASA also plans to launch a nuclear-propelled spacecraft to Mars by 2028.
NASA’s launch window for Artemis II is set to open April. The crewed mission is expected to send the Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft to orbit the moon over 10 days and return to Earth. The crew will test whether the spacecraft operates in deep space.
The long-term goal of the Artemis program is to re-establish a human presence on the moon in preparation for the ultimate aim of putting a human on Mars.
